I want to understand the protocol for body cam footage and how it becomes released. Seems like this puts the officer in a bad light, so who released the footage and why? Is there a standard in place for releasing body cam video? How does it normally come into the hands of the public?
I am not defending or praising the officer...I am genuinely curious.
EDIT: Thanks, guys. I read up a bit on FOIA and have a much better understanding about that now.
Having worked for a local municipality IT: All the electronic information held by the city is public property. Emails, documents, videos; everything. When asked to release information, they are allowed to redact certain personal data points about citizens (such as SSNs) but they are obliged to release the requested information. This is because the public bought those servers, pays the employees, pays the bills to keep everything running, and therefore owns it all.
IANAL, but in most cases, body cam video falls is available through a FOIA request. Often times either the media will file a request or a defense attorney, victim, or individual involved in the incident will have access and release the video on their own. Same with dash cam video from police cruisers.
